Exercise at least 60 minutes a day
Ask HN: How to stay focused and motivated working from home?
11–20 of 84 posts
Re: Ask HN: How to stay focused and motivated working from home?
#12I always found it odd I needed to bring my laptop to another building every day to do work. So I'm enjoying working from home a lot. I do miss some of the occasional real life interactions with colleagues so in that way I do miss walking around in a building.
We start each day with a video call with the team. Even when there's not much to say. Sometimes I just have a voice channel on discord open with a few colleagues where we can spit our stuff.
Re: Ask HN: How to stay focused and motivated working from home?
#13A strong sense of purpose in life. When every productive day brings me closer to realising a wonderful goal, I can endure even the shitty client I am unfortunate to work with.
Better than no client
Re: Ask HN: How to stay focused and motivated working from home?
#14On the flip side: how to stay focused in a loud office? It's surprisingly difficult for me compared to working from home.
Edit: Suggestions for OP. Find purpose; keep your workplace tidy and if possible try to separate work from your free time as much as possible.
Re: Ask HN: How to stay focused and motivated working from home?
#15A strong sense of purpose in life. When every productive day brings me closer to realising a wonderful goal, I can endure even the shitty client I am unfortunate to work with.
This is the most underrated comment in this thread. Purpose is essential in ensuring one's mental well-being. Without it, you hit burnout or depression quickly.
Re: Ask HN: How to stay focused and motivated working from home?
#16One thing I wanted to do (but never did) was to get a dedicated pc for work-related stuff. Because on my current pc distractions are one click away, one minute you are waiting for the pipeline to finish and the next one you find yourself looking at memes.
Re: Ask HN: How to stay focused and motivated working from home?
#17I can relate. And most of the advice to exercise, separete work from personal life, have a routine etc. doesn't seem to help.
Re: Ask HN: How to stay focused and motivated working from home?
#18Sometimes you are not focused because deep inside, you know that the task at hand is not what you need. If this is the case, and you can admit it, then it is an excellent opportunity to reflect on yourself. Maybe you are at a meaningless job, and it is time to move on.
I just want to make a point that lack of focus may not be a bad thing.
Re: Ask HN: How to stay focused and motivated working from home?
#19First, This question is a lot deeper than probably can be answered in a HN comment... but in theory the only thing that changed for you by working from home is the amount of time that you "see" other humans... I would offer that the first place to make an adjustment should be there. Human beings are social animals and we need time around other humans. If you aren't currently getting enough of that you should add it into your life (like working out, or sleeping 8 hours a day).
Second, a while ago someone reframed the "motivation" concept to me and it's been really beneficial. It's easy to think of "motivation" as an extrinsic concept, but most of what we call "motivation" is actually better termed "discipline". It's a lot easier to fix "discipline" issues than "motivation" issues.
Lastly, if the issue is deeper look into the japanese philosophy of ikigai.
(I also find music can be pretty useful)
Re: Ask HN: How to stay focused and motivated working from home?
#20One thing I wanted to do (but never did) was to get a dedicated pc for work-related stuff. Because on my current pc distractions are one click away, one minute you are waiting for the pipeline to finish and the next one you find yourself looking at memes.
I have found this works very well for me. While I use the same PC, I have double boot with Linux for work stuff and Windows for anything fun related.
Since everything that can distract me (except HN) is blocked in Linux, I am forced to reboot to access it which is a great deterrent.